Claiming “numerous courts have found it irrelevant” doesn’t absolve you from the responsibility of making your own argument. If you’re going to suggest reproductive capability is a prerequisite for marriage, then YOU have to explain why infertile heterosexual couples should be allowed to marry under your own rules.
I’ve got news for you. Sperm and eggs unite when homosexual couples have children too, in just the same way they unite when infertile heterosexual couples children. So, again, what do you mean by “basic biology”? Basic biology is essentially the same every time a child is conceived by any means. What point are you trying to make?
You’re the one suggesting the government needs to be involved in civil unions and marriages, again, on the basis of reproductive capacity. You keep suggesting that, then when questioned, you say, “except I don’t really mean it!” Then you suggest it again. Why do you do that?
Again you missed the point. I feel you are doing it purposely.
Anderson v King County: The fundamental right of a man and woman to marry is linked with the related fundamental right to procreate, as noted in Skinner . Skinner v. Oklahoma , 316 U.S. 535, 541, 62 S. Ct. 1110, 86 L. Ed. 1655 (1942) ("[m]arriage and procreation are fundamental to the very existence and survival of the race"); Zablocki v. Redhail , 434 U.S. 374, 98 S. Ct. 673, 54 L. Ed. 2d 618 (1978). Every United States Supreme Court decision concerning the right to marry has assumed marriage as the union of one man and one woman. Every party in every right to marry case that the Supreme Court has ever decided included one man in union with one woman. Those decisions do not support any claim other than the right to marry a person of the opposite sex. Only opposite-sex couples are capable of intentional, unassisted procreation, unlike same-sex couples. Unlike same-sex couples, only opposite-sex couples may experience unintentional or unplanned procreation. State sanctioned marriage as a union of one man and one woman encourages couples to enter into a stable relationship prior to having children and to remain committed to one another in the relationship for the raising of children, planned or otherwise. Although society's continuing existence depends upon children, marriage has never been considered as solely a mechanism to increase the number of births. Modern circumstances confirm that marriage is needed in today's society more than ever. As amicus notes: "Widespread contraceptive and abortion rights may actually make more salient, not less, the traditional role of marriage in encouraging men and women to make the next generation that society needs. The more legal, cultural, and technological choice individuals have about whether or not to have children, the more need there is for a social institution that encourages men and women to have babies together, and creates the conditions under which those children are likely to get the best care." Amicus of Families Northwest at 14-15. Herndanez v Robles: the Legislature could rationally decide that, for the welfare of children, it is more important to promote stability, and to avoid instability, in opposite-sex than in same-sex relationships. Heterosexual intercourse has a natural tendency to lead to the birth of children; homosexual intercourse does not. Despite the advances of science, it remains true that the vast majority of children are born as a result of a sexual relationship between a man and a woman, and the Legislature could find that this will continue to be true. The Legislature could also find that such relationships are all too often casual or Temporary. It could find that an important function of marriage is to create more stability and permanence in the relationships that cause children to be born. It thus could choose to offer an inducement -- in the form of marriage and its attendant benefits -- to opposite-sex couples who make a solemn, long-term commitment to each other. The Legislature could find that this rationale for marriage does not apply with comparable force to same-sex couples. These couples can become parents by adoption, or by artificial insemination or other technological marvels, but they do not become parents as a result of accident or impulse. The Legislature could find that unstable relationships between people of the opposite sex present a greater danger that children will be born into or grow up in unstable homes than is the case with same-sex couples, and thus that promoting stability in opposite- sex relationships will help children more. This is one reason why the Legislature could rationally offer the benefits of marriage to opposite-sex couples only. There is a second reason: The Legislature could rationally believe that it is better, other things being equal, for children to grow up with both a mother and a father. Intuition and experience suggest that a child benefits from having before his or her eyes, every day, living models of what both a man and a woman are like. It is obvious that there are exceptions to this general rule -- some children who never know their fathers, or their mothers, do far better than some who grow up with parents of both sexes -- but the Legislature could find that the general rule will usually hold.
As for your PATHETIC attempt to place words in my mouth, I was asking you a hypothetical. If your premise is correct (it isn't), then why does the government have to be involved in sanctioning civil unions? If the union is not linked to procreation, and if the union is solely about establishing a relationship, give me one good reason for the government to be involved at all?
Governments license marriage for a very specific reason. Can you guess what it is?